


he's got looks that books take pages to tell

by smallredboy



Category: House M.D.
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - 1920s, First Meetings, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, Reclaimed Use Of Queer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-22
Updated: 2019-02-22
Packaged: 2019-11-02 01:53:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17878853
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smallredboy/pseuds/smallredboy
Summary: They meet at a speakeasy.





	he's got looks that books take pages to tell

**Author's Note:**

> GAY RIGHTS!
> 
> title from _blame it on the girls_ by mika
> 
> also fills the 'roaring twenties' prompt in my allbingo Valentine's Day card.
> 
> enjoy!

House is enraptured by the look of a clear businessman at the speakeasy he frequents.

 

Of course, of course — most people there tried to look their best. But there’s a certain air around this man, exhausted and sophisticated, a little out of place amongst illegality. Most likely a strict law-abider before the drys came in and decided to make their good times against it, huh? He’s young looking, in his thirties, if House had to bet on it; a veteran of the Great War, perhaps.

He doesn’t talk much, but he keeps a tight grip on his glass as he drinks and gives weird glances to the band playing for them. Like he’s annoyed by it. 

House swirls his wine on his glass and looks up at Cuddy, bartender slash gangster. He points at the man. “Who is he?” he whispers. “I don’t reckon I’ve seen him before.”   


Cuddy’s brows furrow; she follows his gesture and shrugs. “Oh, he’s new, but that one lady, Amber, seems to have given him the password. Perhaps he’s a copper.”   
  
“You’re this relaxed about a copper bein’ on your site?”   
  
She laughs a little. “Oh, trust me, we have it under control,” she says. “Now go hit on the copper, I know you’re starin’ for a reason.”   
  
“I’m not queer,” he says.

Cuddy laughs a little, and gestures at the businessman again. “And I’m not a lesbo,” she replies with a bit of bite. “Come on, come on, House, drink some more and get some, Lord knows you need it.”   


House rolls his eyes and flips her off, keeps watching the awkward businessman. He’s tired— yes, that’s obvious. He keeps drinking, looking at the jazz band from time to time, his brows knitted together. He is handsome, House can give him that, clean shaven and short hair, no hat on

Okay, he’s going to talk to him. It should be easy. Just some small.  _ You don’t like jazz? What are you doing here? Veteran, aren’t you? How was the Great War?  _ Something like that, he’ll be let off easy. There’ll be no problem at all. He won’t like his company— he doesn’t like much people’s company, apart from Cuddy’s and the occasional person he shares a bed with. 

He sits next to him at the bar, taps his shoulder. He jumps a little and turns around.

“Don’t like jazz?” he asks.

The man shrugs. “Not really. James Wilson, you?”   
  
“Greg House. You a copper? I know you can lie about that crap, but hey, I’m not wasting anythin’ by asking you that.”   


“Nah,” Wilson says, and gives him a smile. “Just a soldier finding my way into some liquor.”   


House looks at him. He was right! “Oh!” he exclaims. “Didn’t know a soldier would go to these lengths for some wine. Tell me, that doll who gave you the password, ‘s she a moll?”   
  
“Oh, no, she’s a friend of mine, she’s not too involved in these things.” Wilson downs some more of his drink and cocks his head at his drink. “You don’t seem of the friendly kind— what’re you doing talking to me?”   
  
“Oh, you looked interesting, all out of place in here— again, you look like you’re a law-abiding citizen.”   
  
“I try to be, but alcohol’s alcohol.”   


House laughs. “Isn’t it?”   


“What do you do for a living?”   
  
“Oh, I’m a doctor,” he says, flashing him a smile. 

Wilson looks at him and fixes his suit, runs a hand through his hair. “I planned to be a doctor before— you know, the Great War, but it is how it is.” He cocks his head a little. “You didn’t get drafted?”   
  
“Nah,” he agrees. “Was forty when the war broke off in our front. A bit too old for fighting in the trenches, I believe.”   
  
“Oh, yeah, I was thirty-five but my father’s a bit of a legend because of his doings for the Union, and so they wanted a Wilson in their files. And my brother’s mysterious disappearance didn’t help, so…” he trails off, and blushes. “I apologize, I didn’t mean to go in a tangent.”   
  
House listens to him closely and shakes his head. “Don’t worry about it. It’s not like I will see you again after you leave those doors—” he says, pointing at the front door of the speakeasy.

He raises a brow. “I sure would like to see you again.”   
  
“What for?”   
  
“You seem to be queer,” Wilson says. House can feel sweat running down his back, his palms getting a bit sticky with it. He’s a little exposed in the dim light of their place of meeting, of drinking, of the fun the government isn’t allowing them. “And it’s lonely out here,” he adds quickly, and House draws in a breath of relief. “Haven’t got the courage to go to a club of ours.”   


“Oh,” he says, staring. He’s not sure what to say.

“We can go over at my place— a doctor and a soldier, discussing business.”   
  
Wilson puts a hand on his knee, and House is a little dizzy with it all. He’s a bit tipsy, maybe, he has drank a bit since he’s got here— Wilson’s definitely drank more, with his whole soldier thing going on. He knows many of them frequenting speakeasies for the same reasons.

“We can’t raise suspicion,” House whispers.

He smiles at him and pulls his hand away. “I am aware. I think you and I are gonna go along just swell, Greg.”   
  
“Oh, call me House. I assume you prefer James?”   
  
“No, no, Wilson’s just fine.”   


House stands up, and from the corner of his eye, he can see Cuddy grinning at him a bit smugly.

The streets are dim even with the lights above, and Wilson keeps a foot in between them, almost as if he can sense House’s growing paranoia that someone will see them and just know what’s happening. House hasn’t had as much experience with other men as much as he’d like to— for the most part, it’s women. He likes them, or so he thinks, but he doesn’t know many people with the same kind of queerness as him. The liking both, liking women’s curves and the way it feels to be on his knees for a man. 

And he might be a little nervous, a lot nervous, wondering how it’s going to feel to be pressed up against a wall in another man’s house. How Wilson will press kisses to his collar and work his suit down and off, pin his wrists above his head. . .

Oh, he’s got it bad, alright.

As soon as he’s inside, Wilson grabs his face and pulls him closer, a hand on his cheek and the other one on the back of his neck, looking at him carefully, fondly, like he’s something worth looking at, a piece of art, maybe.    
  
“May I kiss you?”   


House smiles a little. “That’s what we came here for.”   


And so he leans in, and he kisses him, and he drags him into the bedroom, all muted colors and yet so vivid, and Wilson’s lips are silk-smooth against his own. He drinks the sigh that comes out of Wilson’s mouth, kisses him senseless until they bump into the nightstand, House letting out curses.

Wilson pulls away, blushing darker. “I apologize,” he says, ducking his head.

House smiles at him and pulls him into another kiss— as much as he’d like to have sex with him, to sleep with him and leave as soon as the sun is up, he doesn’t prefer it over talking with the other man. He starts taking Wilson’s clothes off while muttering about the president and the Great War and art and how jazz is actually good, piss off.

He presses kisses to Wilson’s neck as Wilson puts him down on the bed, spreads his legs all too gently. There’s a quiet bond going on, and God, House wants it all— he wants anything he can get with this mysterious veteran with an affinity for liquor and for talking about politics with a silver tongue.

House says bad jokes, wraps his legs around the other man’s waist.

“I’ve never seen a man quite as dashing as yourself,” Wilson breathes, looking down at him.

House is sure he can see constellations in his brown, brown eyes as he leans up and kisses him. 

“And I’ve never seen a man quite as dashing as myself,” he says.

Wilson scoffs, rolls his eyes, but he doesn’t stop. Maybe his smugness is as much of an attractive quality as some ladies say it is.

When Wilson finishes, they wrap themselves in each other’s arms, away from the rest of the world. A world of their own, House guesses as he peppers kisses across Wilson’s neck. Maybe in another moment, in other time this would be a one night stand, a thing to leave the morning after just as the sun goes up.

But as Wilson mutters about how he hates the jazz band in the speakeasy they met at, oh, House knows this can, should and will be more.


End file.
